


Nobody's Child

by Sir_Thopas



Series: Corsicon [3]
Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers: Beast Wars
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Synesthesia, War Crimes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-30
Updated: 2012-06-07
Packaged: 2017-10-28 12:49:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 13,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/308038
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sir_Thopas/pseuds/Sir_Thopas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Waspinator looked at the dead faces of bots he once knew. He tried to remember their names. He knew them once a long time ago, but now the memories just slipped through his processor like water.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

The official story was that the soldiers at the front were slowly pushing the Maximals back. They were heavily entrenched and the Maximals – weak, pathetic Maximals – were unable break the line. They were running out of resources and mechpower. In a few months the rebellion would be over and the Predacons would be free to live under the own rule.

It didn't take long for the common bot to realize that something was very, very wrong and that the government wasn't giving them the full story. It started with rumors. The electronic letters and missives that the soldiers sent to their progenitors and mates and offspring began to change. Instead of detailing the power of the Predacons and the thrill of killing their Maximal enemies, they were now full of stories about soldiers falling ill in the trenches, the crazed fever that overtook him, how they were forced to lock the sick and dying inside the infirmaries lest they blindly attack any creature that came near them. In-fighting was common amongst the Predacons, but there was always a motive behind every act of sedition. The only way to advance through the ranks was through combat. But there was neither rhyme nor reason to the fights that had begun to break out amongst the Predacon soldiers. They attacked as though possessed. And it appeared as though it were just the Predacon soldiers; the letters gave no indication that the Maximals were suffering from the same mysterious virus as they.

Then the letters stopped.

Their great leader, Razorclaw, claimed that the Maximals had destroyed their signal tower. That was acceptable; of course the Maximals would want to knock out communications. Yet why would the government never bother to fix it? It didn't make sense. How could the generals send out their commands without the tower? What would become of the army? Then Razorclaw left Corsicon for the Gamma Colony, leaving Headstrong in charge of the rebellion. Officially it was to oversee the reinforcements. Officially. Headstrong sent out one last report, telling the Predacons that Razorclaw was proud of the sacrifices that they had made and that their honored soldiers would bring glory to the Predacon Empire. That was the last anyone had heard from the government before the entire planet went silent.

The short Predacon flier looked out his window at all the strained, nervous faces of the bots walking by. They carried cannons and guns in their arms, scurrying about to get them into position, constantly looking over the shoulders as though expecting something to leap out of the shadows and take them. Something was coming and the city had to be fortified by nightfall. If the Maximals thought they could take over Corsicon then they were sorely mistaken. This was their home. They would never leave it. Not without a fight. The flier looked out past the city skyline into the jungle that loomed across the horizon where he could hear the screams of many bots floating on the wind.

The flier pulled away and slunk into the shadows of his secret room, covering his audios with his servos, praying the screaming would stop. He was safe. No one knew he was here. No one knew he existed. His secret room kept him hidden from the outside world. His progenitor would make sure the government didn't find him and drag him off to fight on the frontline. He was safe.

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The flier flickered on his optics, but no matter how hard he tried he couldn't get them to full power. Everything was fuzzy and the colors didn't look quite right. It took him a moment to realize he was lying on his berth. When did he end up here? It didn't matter. It felt like he was floating. His berth had transformed into a bed made of clouds. The flier tried to laugh, but it got caught in his vocalizer.

Something moved in the corner of his optics. The shape looked vaguely familiar. He felt a servo touch his arm and realized it was his progenitor. The flier wanted to beg the older bot to let him stay, to tell him he was still just a youngling – his youngling – and he didn't want to go to the front. He didn't want to die in a trench with the sounds of guns all around him. Couldn't he just stay at home a little longer? He was scared.

He felt the servo slip away and the other bot was gone. The flier wanted to cry out but he couldn't. Everything hurt. Was he ill? Did he have a virus? Was he dying? He thought he heard screaming.

The next time the flier awoke from recharge he couldn't make his optics come on at all. All around him was darkness but he could hear and feel. He thought he heard his progenitor speaking, but it sounded muffled and foggy, like he was underwater. He was moving. There were strong servos taking him somewhere.

There was a persistent ringing in his audios that he couldn't get rid of. He tried to access his onboard computer to tell it to make the ringing stop. It made his head hurt. But the voice wasn't there. He couldn't access it. His system felt like it was overheating.

He felt the servos set him down and the moment he touched the cold floor the flier was unconscious again.

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The flier blearily switched on his optics and a flood of color crashed into his processor. There was some sort of metal sheet lying on top of him, as though protecting him from something. It was a wondrous green color. What a strange color. He didn't think metal came in those shades of green. He didn't think anything came in that color. With a shove he pushed the piece of metal off of him. It clattered against the floor, ringing out, and he could taste purple. It was bitter, like poison. He rubbed his optics and stood on shaky legs as he took in the room around him. He was in a small room with a secret door. Everything in the room had been destroyed. The flier briefly wondered what had happened before pushing it out of his processor and going for the door.

It slid open and lying there in front of him was a large mech; he had been dead for at least a few solar cycles. He was older than the flier and was colored a bright ringing bells. The flier bent down and examined his face. He thought he might have looked familiar but the flier couldn't remember.

The flier moved away and left the unit, stepping out into the street. It was bright. The yellow stabbed his optics and the flier flinched. He thought he might have been in the sweet-smelling darkness for a very, very long time. The flier looked up and down the street. Everywhere he saw the empty corpses of dead bots. Some looked as though they had died of sickness and others as though they had been overcome with some unidentifiable rage and had torn each other limb from limb. There was mech fluid on the street; it was old, it had been there for a while.

The dead city was completely silent. The flier strained his audios but he heard nothing. He tasted nothing. He was the only one alive. What had happened? He couldn't remember.

He knew he couldn't stay though. There was nothing left here. The flier transformed into a helicopter and took off into the jungle.


	2. Chapter 2

The flier peeked over the ridge and spotted an abandoned Maximal camp. He briefly contemplated transforming into vehicle mode to do a fly-by before quickly dismissing the idea. He needed to be quiet. His helicopter mode was too loud; it announced to anyone nearby that there was a very silly bot who didn't know how to be sneaky.

"Know how to be sneaky," the flier sniffed to himself, insulted by the invisible mech that didn't exist but nonetheless dared to think he wasn't sneaky enough. "Not stupid," he insisted, driving the point home.

The flier quietly left his hiding spot. He ventured into the camp, noting the trenches the soldiers had dug and the hastily erected buildings where the officers had barked out their commands from. Peeking inside the slowly decaying buildings, the flier could see that the Maximals had left a long time ago and had taken their supplies with them. He frowned to himself, kicking up the black dirt that coated the floor of the empty unit, watching as it glimmered melodiously as it settled. The flier was mesmerized by the sight. It fell so slowly and gracefully.

A slight scuffling outside the building broke the flier's reverie. He knew it couldn't be some organic beast; the Predacons destroyed them all when they conquered the planet, just as they would have demolished the ever-encroaching jungle given time. Which meant it could only be one of them.

The flier poked his head out, glancing around. He spotted the Predacon soon enough. He was grotesque; one arm looked as though it had been ripped off, circuits hanging loosely from the socket. From a fight? The flier tried to think back. He remembered bots getting sick. They started to attack each other, didn't they? Or was he confusing the present with the past again? He thought he remembered his own processor beginning to overheat with illness and his circuits frying one by one. He had repaired himself though; the others hadn't. Every Predacon that the flier had met so far appeared to be mad with rage. It was like their entire processor had shut down except for one simple directive: kill. Otherwise, they may as well have been offline. The flier watched as the mech shuffled about the camp, his optics unseeing as his pedes continued to carry him from place to place. He hadn't seen the flier. He would have attacked if he had. The flier quickly ducked back inside, his processor racing. Should he make a run for it? The mech would surely spot him then. Hide? He'd be trapped. The flier nervously shuffled from ped to ped, before making up his processor. The mech didn't look like he was capable of flying. The flier could run out of the building and into the open and hope that he could transform fast enough before the mech reached him.

The shuffling was getting louder. He was closing in on the building. The flier gulped; he had no choice. With a yell the flier barreled out of the door and into the torso of the Predacon. He immediately felt the other mech's servos latch onto his back, clawing and punching, desperately trying to tear him to pieces. Once the sun hit his structure the flier wasted no time and transformed, his helicopter blades springing out and slicing into the Predacon that was still scrabbling on top of him. It was as though the wound didn't even register. The mech didn't notice the fluid oozing out of his sliced torso, his servos just continued dig into the flier's structure as he began to lift off, before finally slipping and falling to the ground. The flier didn't give him a chance to get back up and took off into the sky.

The flier slowly made his way back into the jungle. He would continue scavenging for oil and energon tomorrow. Right now he just wanted to leave.

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The flier hunkered down in the makeshift shelter he had made out of broken branches and rusted sheet metal. He had built it on top of a tall outcropping, high enough so that he could see all around him, just in case any of the others got too close. The flier hummed and buzzed happily as he stacked up his cans of oil. He grinned and stepped back, admiring his work. It was a throne! The flier perched on top of the piled cans and surveyed his kingdom with an appropriate sense of dignity and sophistication. "Kingbot command all he sees!" He clicked out haltingly. He blearily noted that his words weren't coming out quite right, but he couldn't make his processor think of the right ones. It didn't bother him anyway. What did it matter? "Kingbot only bot here! Can't tell Kingbot to go hide! Kingbot want to go out, then Kingbot go out."

The flier looked to his left and imagined a tall bot standing there. He tried to picture a face, but couldn't think of one. The only thing that came to his mind was a broad mech painted a bright ringing bells. "But the Predacons will make you fight the Maximals!" The bot protested, clasping his servos in supplication. "You'll be killed!"

The flier laughed condescendingly. "Kingbot not afraid of stupid Maximals! Kingbot will destroy them all! Kingbot RULES!"

The flier immediately shrank back as his voice echoed against the rocky outcropping, sounding like a violent shove. His imaginary kingdom and subjects vanished as he worriedly looked down into the jungle, trying to determine if any of the others had heard him. The foliage remained still and unmoving; there was nothing down there. The flier let out an intake as he sat back on his haunches. "Need to be quiet," the flier berated himself in a soft whisper. "Or scarybots come and then that will be it."

The flier scooted over to his 'throne' and plucked a can of oil off of it, cracking it open and guzzling it down in a few sips. It tasted a horrid sickly sweet yellow that left a filmy residue clinging to his glossa. It was old. The flier had picked it up in a unit outside of one of the cities. There were probably fresher supplies within the confines of the city. The flier could remember watching long lines of bots waiting to receive their rations. He had never done that; someone else did that for him. At least he thought that was right. He could picture the building in his processor and its never-ending queue; there would be plenty of supplies there. But he didn't like the cities. They were dangerous. The corpses frightened him and there were too many places that the others could hide in. No, it was better to forage in places with wide open spaces: battlefields and solitary home units. Even if it meant going hungry. The flier sighed as he curled up on the ground, letting himself drift off into recharge. His thoughts buzzed dreamily about energon that tasted like sweet-spun clouds.

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The flier held on to his metal container as he carefully picked his way through the jungle, making sure not to break any of the plants. The others didn't seem intelligent, but the flier didn't want to make himself easier to find either. He zigzagged through the undergrowth, hoping that if any diseased Predacons still lurking in the darkness manage to follow him they would get lost by his erratic trail.

The flier began to hum happily to himself before clamping down on the noise. He was out in the wild; he couldn't make noise. Sneaky, sneaky, sneaky, the flier droned within his processor. "Sneaky."

The flier entered a small glade when he came to a sudden stop and stared down at the ground. There, right in front of him, was a strange plant surrounded by a halo of springing light he had never seen before. The flier didn't like the jungle plants; he didn't like their sticky tendrils that seemed to press in on all sides. But this one was different. The other plants were large and green and suffocating; this one was small and delicate with petals that felt cool, still water. Flower, his processor supplied.

The flier looked around in search for any of the others. The others stomped through the jungle and the cities without thinking; their only drive was to kill. They would crush the flower without even knowing it was there. The flier shifted the container in his servos. He was going to use it to carry supplies, but this was more important. He carefully placed the container upside down on top of the flower, enshrouding it in darkness. He smiled. There! Now the flower was safe.

The flier clasped his servos over his audios as he heard fiery red crash into gray and black, melting angry and violent. He looked up to see a ship with plumes of smoke coming from its engines plummeting out of the sky, careening towards the ground far too quickly for it to be on purpose. How long had he been on his own? Lunar cycles? In all that time he had never seen a ship. What was it doing here? The flier watched as the ship shook and rattled dangerously, before falling behind the trees somewhere up ahead. The flier transformed and immediately followed the smoky trail; he needed to get there before the others got to it first.


	3. Chapter 3

The flier peeked cautiously around an ancient tree, pushing its squiggly, clanging branches away from his face. He could see the ship lying in an open field. It was small; a personal ship built so that it could be piloted by only one crewman. It had once been painted a deep wide ocean, but the paint had been burnt off leaving jagged canyons of ash on its hull. Thunderous black smoke rose steadily from its crushed nose; if the noise didn't attract the others then the smoke certainly would. The flier needed to get in and get out fast.

The flier darted out into the field, keeping low to the ground so that the tall grass could obscure his short frame. He came up to the ship and pressed his servo against the hull before immediately pulling it back with a hiss. He cradled his injured servo to his chassis as though that would help ease the pain. The metal had felt like a wide wave of crimson, somewhere the flier had never seen. The flier poked his head through a gaping hole on the side of the ship where the door had once been. The metallic door now lay on the grass, a dark scorch mark marring whatever brilliancy it once had. It looked as though the door had been shot off from the inside. The flier searched the interior and spotted a mech lying face down and unmoving on the floor, clutching an energy pistol loosely in his servo. From the wings that jutted out from his back the flier could guess that his alt-mode was some sort of jet or plane. The flier quickly moved over to him and pushed him onto his back. He was a handsome mech, a sonorous searing touch to look at. The insignia blazoned across his chassis marked him as a fellow Predacon.

"Jetbot wake up now," the flier commanded, nudging the other mech with his ped. The Predacon remained in stasis and offline. The flier gave a huff of annoyance and kicked the Predacon in the shin. Still nothing. Since kicking didn't work, the flier briefly wondered if punching him in the face would do the trick but his processor corrected him, telling him that it would just do more damage and then the flier would have to wait even longer for the bot to wake up. The flier shrugged and punched him anyway. He wasn't a medic, so how would his processor know what would or wouldn't work? It was best to try all options. The bot remained there unmoving though, and the flier had to concede that maybe his own processor knew more than he did. Wasn't that strange? The flier didn't think it was suppose to work like that, but before he could dwell on it the thought was gone in a puff of smoke like so many before.

A distant rustling pulled the flier from his musings. Peeking out, he could see the others making their way to the ship through the tall grass. In a panic the flier grabbed the Predacon and raced out of the ship, hoping that he would be able to outrun the others with his heavy load.

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It was the pain that woke Terrorcon from his recharge. He groaned at the ache in his chassis and wings. They seemed to have taken the most damage. At least he knew he hadn't been caught by the Maximals; they would have put him in a CR chamber if they had and he wouldn't be lying here wishing someone would put him out of his misery. With another groan, Terrorcon finally forced his optics online. He lay there, confused, as he took in the strange hovel made of stone and scrap metal. This was… unexpected.

A face suddenly appeared right next to his. Terrorcon nearly jumped out of his structure at the sudden appearance of another bot; not that he would ever admit that. "Jetbot awake now?" The strange bot demanded as he scanned Terrorcon's body with his optics, making the Predacon feel decidedly uncomfortable.

With a screech of annoyance, Terrorcon shoved the little glitch away and stood up, knocking his helm against the "roof" of the hovel. "Where the slag am I?" He demanded, glaring down at the other bot. The glitchy little bot didn't even seem to realize that he was supposed to be intimidated by Terrorcon, which just further irritated the Predacon.

The bot threw his servos against his audios and scrunched up his face. "Jetbot sound like sour yellow."

Terrorcon just stared at the mech, unsure of what to say. A lot of bots complained about his screechy voice, but none of them had ever described it quite like that before. Obviously there was something wrong with this bot's processor. Terrorcon folded his arms over his chassis. "My designation is Terrorcon, not Jetbot," he corrected.

"Terrorbot," the glitch said, trying out the new word on his glossa.

Terrorcon scowled. "No, not Terrorbot, Terrorcon!"

"Terror…" Here the bot screwed up his face as though trying to force the word out of his mouth. "BOT!"

"Terrorcon! Con! Con! CON!"

"Terrorbot! Bot! Bot! BOT!"

Terrorcon slapped his servo against his face, contemplating whether or not he should just shoot the bot and find his own way out of here. "Okay… let's try something else. What's your designation?"

The other mech just stared uncomprehendingly before shrugging his shoulders.

"Come on, everyone has a name! What do you call yourself?"

The bot put a digit to his mouth in contemplation before brightening. "Kingbot!" He chirped happily.

Terrorcon stared down at him. "That is not a real name."

"Too bad. Kingbot likes it."

"I'm not going to call you that!" Terrorcon said with a huff. "If you don't have a name then I'll just have to give you one. Let's see…" Terrorcon idly tapped his ped against the rock as he thought. "You need a respectable, Predacon name… Maybe the name of a Decepticon soldier from the Great War? You're a weird, glitchy little mech, so how about Wasp? They say he was a spy- albeit a crazy one."

The bot – now Wasp – folded his arms and pouted. "Sounds stupid. Like Kingbot better."

Terrorcon ignored him and looked out over the outcrop that Wasp had built his camp on. A grim, still jungle spread out before him. In the distance he saw the shiny silver of buildings glinting off the afternoon sun. So, wherever he was at least he knew he was somewhere civilized, and yet… Everything seemed unnaturally calm and quiet. It was like he and Wasp were the only things alive on the planet. The thought made Terrorcon shiver.

The Predacon shook his head. He was being stupid. He needed to get out of here before the Maximals tracked him down. Going back to his ship was out of the question; after that crash he doubted it would ever fly again. The only option left was the city in the distance. He might be able to buy a small space hopper – or, more likely, steal one – and enough gas to get him to the next safe haven. He looked over at Wasp, who was staring at him with blatant curiosity. He sincerely doubted that Wasp had anything worth stealing, which was a shame. "Well, thanks for pulling me from the wreckage," Terrorcon drawled as he transformed into his jet mode. "I could have killed you, but since you helped me I decided not to. My gift to you."

He barely flew a few feet before Wasp called after him. "Wait! Terrorbot can't leave! Terrorbot will get killed!"

Terrorcon turned around to face the little glitch. "What are you talking about?" The disdain dripping from his voice was audible.

"Scarybots live in jungle! They kill everything! Scarybots are monsters! They'll kill Terrorbot!"

Obviously, Wasp's processor was more corrupted than he thought if he believed monsters lived in the jungle. "Please. There's no such thing." Terrorcon laughed wickedly. "Or maybe there is. Maybe they just like to go after damaged little glitches like you, so if I were you I'd keep my mouth shut and hope they don't hear you." With that Terrorcon flew off, although he could still hear Wasp stamping his pedes and yelling after him.

"Fine! Terrorbot go get killed! Wasp doesn't care! And Wasp is stupid name!"

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Terrorcon dropped to the ground and transformed about a mile away from the city, deep in the jungle undergrowth, hoping that it would provide some cover. His valve was pumping erratically in his chassis as he glanced around cautiously. He hadn't come across any of Wasp's monsters, but that didn't change the fact that there was something very, very wrong with this place. He had not seen a single sign of life. There was no sound of engines, no fliers in the sky, no bots on the ground. The entire area – if not the whole planet – was dead.

And something had to have killed them.

Terrorcon cautiously made his way into the city, walking carefully down the empty streets and always on the lookout for any potential threat. He wondered what planet his ship had crashed on; he thought he had been on course to the Gamma Colony, but his instruments had been shot through in the last run-in he had with the Maximal police. He had been forced to make an estimated guess and when he saw the small planet he had assumed it was the Gamma moon. But there weren't any jungles on the Gamma Colony and then there was the vast emptiness… Surely if an entire planet had gone dead he'd know about it, right? Those bleeding heart Maximals would have never shut up about it. They'd already have charities set up and give themselves little pats on the back about how wonderfully wonderful they were for giving their credits to those poor, primitive Preds.

What had killed the planet? A virus? An attack? And for that matter, where were the corpses? Unless this planet went dead centuries ago there was no way that the corpses could have completely rusted away. There should be some evidence.

Terrorcon nearly jumped out of his structure when he heard a sudden shout. It sounded like some mech giving out orders to a crew. The sound of another bot's voice broke through the quiet, scaring him more than the silence did. But then he realized: there was someone here! The planet wasn't dead after all!

Terrorcon made his way guardedly through the city, peeking around the buildings in search of the mysterious voice. He came around a corner before leaping back in fear, ready to transform in case they saw him. He didn't hear the pounding pedes against cement or the shouts of dozens of mechs, and so Terrorcon assumed his presence had gone unnoticed. He stuck his head around the corner and observed a dozen or so Maximals piling body after body of deceased Predacons onto a recycler. He could tell by their movements and the way they obeyed the orders of their leader that these mechs were Maximal soldiers. Just what exactly had happened here?

Terrorcon turned his head back just in time to see a strange Predacon hobble his way down the street. He looked like he had been to the Pit and back. Scratches and gauges littered his structure and one of his pedes had been torn off at the ankle joint. He didn't even seem to notice as he continued to drag the still oozing stump against the concrete. Terrorcon watched as he turned his lifeless optics onto the oblivious Maximals.


	4. Chapter 4

There was a little voice in the back of Terrorcon's processor, just a bit of the errant primitive programming that still ran its loops through his circuits since the days of the first Decepticons. This voice was currently telling him to run and that something was seriously wrong, something that he might not be able to fight or trick his way out of. It was repelled by the sight of the staggering Predacon and the stench of rust that followed him. But Terrorcon was far too curious to leave, so he merely crept out of sight, ducking behind a small wall that looked as though the top part had been blasted off, and watched what he assumed was going to be the brutal skid-kicking of one Predacon against a whole troop of Maximals.

He didn't turn to look when he heard the Maximals call out and the sound of blasters being shot; he only waited for the Predacon to fall and go offline. But he didn't. He dragged onward, oblivious of the danger, and that was when Terrorcon turned to look at the Maximals, wondering at just who could have such terrible aim. Terrorcon gasped and stumbled back, falling back out onto the street into broad daylight. There were dozens of Predacons advancing on the Maximals as they poured into the city from the jungle interior. They looked just as dented and torn as the first one, like they had all just ran through a battlefield, getting shot and beaten at every turn. They didn't notice; all they seemed to care about were the Maximals. The Maximals were screaming orders at each other, trying to mow down the advancing line. He saw one of the Preds grab hold of a Maximal and tear his arm straight out of its socket before pushing him down and reaching into the hole to pull out the broken circuits. Terrorcon had never felt pity for a Maximal before, but the emotion he felt now was, if not pity, then something close to it.

Terrorcon screeched in fear and panic the moment he felt the cool metal hand of another bot on his shoulder. Without thinking, he whipped around and pulled out his gun, shooting the limping Predacon that he had first seen right between the optics. The Predacon collapsed as his body immediately shut down and began system repairs. Terrorcon didn't know what this Pred's deal was, but he sure as the Pit didn't want him up again. With that thought, Terrorcon was on his pedes and delivering shot after shot into his chest where he knew his spark lay.

Terrorcon nearly leapt out of his structure when a bullet whizzed by his helm. He whirled around to see that the Maximals had turned and were now training their guns and blasters on him, while the structures of the Predacons they had shot lay at their pedes. Terrorcon immediately dropped his blaster and held up his servos in surrender, knowing that the Maximals would never shoot an unarmed Pred, unlike the Predacons themselves. The two races might downright hate each other, but those goody-two-pedes could never do something as unethical-

The Maximals opened fire.

Terrorcon pulled out a hidden gun from his sub-compartment and shot off a couple rounds before high-tailing it out of there. What in the Pit is going on? Terrorcon wondered frantically. These Maxmals aren't playing by the rules!

Terrorcon stumbled, turning his head back to see what had tripped him only for the motion to nearly send him sprawling forward. He was starting to feel a little dizzy, like his processor wasn't reading the codes his optics sent to it properly. Wasn't that strange? Terrorcon stumbled around, trying to get his bearings. He should transform and fly out of there, but it was getting hard to concentrate. It felt like his structure was on fire. Why weren't his fans working?

His tripped over his own pedes and Terrorcon pitched forward, landing hard on his torso. This was it. The Maximals were going to get him. They apparently didn't seem too interested in arresting him and giving him a fair trial. He was going to get shot in the back while he lay helpless on the street. Terrorcon wasn't big on all that Predaconial warrior slag; he much preferred to lie and cheat to get what he wanted, and turn tail and run like a coward when things turned sour, but he reviled at how pathetic his death would be. Terrorcon heard the crunching sound of pedes walking towards him and looked up to see two green and yellow legs. He'd seen that unusual color combination before, but where? There was the sound of blaster fire and he felt servos pulling him away before he slipped into stasis.

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Wasp laid out Terrorcon on the stone floor of his hut and watched as his fans worked overtime trying to siphon off the feverish crackling. Wasp knew that when Terrorcon woke up he'd be like the others. Wasp figured he should just kill him now, but he didn't want that. He didn't realize how lonely he was until Terrorcon came.

As Wasp continued to observe the Predacon struggle with every intake, he remembered that he had once gotten sick like Terrorcon and the others. Yet he was normal– relatively speaking, at least. Why was that? Wasp thought he might have known the answer to that question once, but it was difficult to remember. He could see the files inside his own mind, but every time he tried to open one of them nothing happened and a brief warning sign flashed before his optics. It was like they were locked or had been purged. His processor tried to explain that it was because of the virus; the burning heat had fried those circuits, it said, but Wasp was tired of listening to uppity processors that knew more than the bot whose helm they resided in.

Wasp scooted closer to Terrorcon, touching his arm only to draw back as he felt the swampy stench. If Wasp could survive the virus almost completely unscathed, then why couldn't Terrorcon? His processor brought up a complete diagnostics of his anti-virus software. It showed him that his software hadn't registered the virus at first; the program had ignored the infectious disease and let it continue to wreck havoc on his systems, completely unaware that there was a problem to begin with. That is what happened when Cybertronians encountered a new virus: if a virus's information wasn't already in the software's database then their anti-viral programs wouldn't realize that anything was wrong. New viruses had to be downloaded into the system for the software to work. But Wasp's software had done something that no other's had before. It recognized the symptoms he had been experiencing, knew that this wasn't how a Cybertronian body should operate, and sought out the only foreign body within his structure, adapting itself to eliminate the threat.

But Wasp knew that wasn't going to happen for Terrorcon. Terrorcon would get sicker and sicker until he became one of them. If he lived that was. He might just end up dead, which Wasp thought might have been the lesser of two evils. Wasp survived because he was different- he didn't know why or how, but he did know that much. Still, Terrorcon didn't need an anti-virus program like Wasp's. Wasp grinned to himself as he rolled Terrorcon onto his torso to get at a panel in the back of the other bot's helm. Wasp's own program had done the work for Terrorcon. All he needed to do was download the information from his software into Terrorcon's.

Wasp pulled out the hook-up cords from his own body and plugged himself in while starting up the download sequence.

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Terrorcon blearily turned on his optics to once again find himself staring at Wasp's scrap metal ceiling. Memories flooded his neural circuits and the Predacon sat up with alarm.

"Terrorbot must lie down! Still hot to touch!" Wasp chastised and pushed on his shoulder with his servos. Terrorcon realized that he was indeed still overheating a little, but not at all like he had back in the city. It seemed like his fans were starting to work properly again and in a cycle or two he'd be completely back to normal.

Terrorcon slapped Wasp's servos away, too angry and scared to listen to the little glitch. "What in the Pit is going on here?" He demanded. "Why were the Maximals burning bodies? Why did I overheat and collapse? AND WHO IN THE INFERNO WERE THOSE GLITCHY PREDS?"

"Those are others," Wasp sniffed as though affronted by the other Predacon's pushy attitude. "Wasp tried to warn Terrorbot, but noooo. Terrorbot know everything!"

Terrorcon huffed out an exasperated sigh and folded his arms over his torso. "Stop being a complete brat and just tell me."

"Terrorbot got sick. Every bot got sick. Lots of bots died because of virus. The others got sick too, but others they lived, so they become others. Wasp got sick, but Wasp knew how to stop virus. Wasp saved Terrorbot." Wasp grinned and puffed out his torso, obviously proud of this accomplishment. Terrorcon was impressed; he would have never thought that Wasp of all bots could unlock a virus's information and program software to find and purge it. Terrorcon had just thought Wasp was this glitchy little idiot, but if he could do that… Terrorcon shook his head. There must be more going on here than he realized. He was just about to ask when Wasp suddenly frowned and looked up at Terrorcon in puzzlement. "What Maximals?" He asked.


	5. Chapter 5

"Should Wasp and Terrorbot go after Maximals?" Wasp asked as they picked their way through the jungle, cradling their scavenged supplied in their servos.

Terrorcon sighed in frustration. Did the little frag ever shut up? All day long he pestered him, chattering about whatever inane thing his processor thought up. When Terrorcon yelled at him to be quiet, Wasp just turned snippy and whined. When Terrorcon ignored him, Wasp ended up yapping to himself, forcing Terrorcon to listen in to his deranged one-sided conversations. In the end it was better to just answer his questions and hoped that it took him a while to process it, giving Terrorcon a few nanoclicks of blissful silence. "Why would we do that?" The flier grumbled. "We're two mechs against a whole battalion of Maximals. It's suicide. I'm all for a little Maximal baiting, but I'm not stupid." Terrorcon grumbled low under his breath, "Unlike some mechs."

Wasp looked like he was thinking hard on the answer he had given. "Maximals want to control Predacons," Wasp stuttered out slowly, as though trying to recite something that he had long forgotten. "But Predacons must fight back. It's natural for Predacons to dominate. It's coding."

Terrorcon rolled his optics when he recognized that Wasp was quoting the same Predacon propaganda that had been spewing out of the vocalizers of Razorclaw and his fellow Decepticons since their very creation. Terrorcon could even see the words scrawling across the holographic signs that littered most Predacon cities as though he was there staring up at them. Sometimes they appealed to the religious: The Predacons Shall Inherit Cybertron! Cybertron is Primus's Promise to His Chosen People! Other times, they touted scientific facts on why Predacons were inherently better suited to rule than Maximals, complete with little diagrams on the evolution of Decepticon to Predacon, and citing the high number of coding devoted to domination and aggression that were found in Predacon programming as compared to that of Maximals as proof. "You sound like one of those revolutionaries," Terrorcon grumbled. He was tired of revolutionaries. It wasn't as though he liked the Maximals; they could take their holier-than-thou attitudes and shove them right up their exhaust pipes for all he cared. It was just Terrorcon hadn't met a revolutionary yet whom he thought could actually take on the Maximals and win. After all, he'd been a blockade runner and smuggler for years now, ferrying goods passed Maximal lines to Razorclaw's army, but the former Decepticon had yet to deliver on his grand promises. Now, if Terrorcon were running the Tripredacus Council things would be much different. Terrorcon had big plans, plans that were guaranteed to work, it was just a shame no one else thought so.

"Wasp's progenitor is revolutionary!" The little glitch piped up, sounding inordinately pleased with himself. "He is very important in Predacon army!"

Now that little bit of information certainly piqued Terrorcon's interest. He was just about to ask more when he turned back to look at Wasp. The little flier was silently trailing behind him, his face scrunched up with some unidentified emotion. He looked… confused and scared. Terrorcon whipped his head back around, berating himself. Unless he wanted to deal with a grieving, emotional Wasp it was best he didn't bring that subject up again. After all, if what Wasp had said was true and this virus had infected everyone on the planet then his progenitor was dead at best and a mindless bloodthirsty drone at worse.

Terrorcon stopped dead in his tracks, almost causing Wasp to bump into him. His servos clutched the cans of oil tightly, denting the metal containers with the strength of his grip. He needed to know something and Wasp was the only one with the answer. Ever since he had seen those Maximal soldiers destroying the empty shells of his fellow Predacons yesterday there was a niggling thought in the back of his processor whispering terrible things to him. Things he didn't want to accept.

"Wasp… what's the name of this planet?"

For a few seconds there was nothing but silence and then Wasp burst into laughter. "Don't Terrorbot know? Terrorbot must be so stupid not to know!" He howled.

"Shut it, you stupid little glitch, and just tell me!" Terrorcon demanded as he turned sharply on his heel and stared down into the flier's red optics.

Wasp gulped at the fury on Terrorcon's face. "Corsicon. Planet is called Corsicon," He whispered.

Terrorcon's optics fluttered at the words. When he had first realized that he hadn't crashed on Gamma Colony like he had originally hoped, he had assumed that he had been on some backward trading outpost, barely a footnote in the annals of the Predacon Empire. After all, no one had responded to his cries for help, there had been no transmissions coming from the cities. Surely a planet of any importance would have had such technology. But then everyone knew that Corsicon had gone silent two weeks ago after the Maximals had ousted Razorclaw and conquered it for themselves. The Maximal Council had issued a statement saying that all communication between the planet and the outside world had been suspended for the time being due to security concerns. The Maximals couldn't allow such an energon-rich planet like Corsicon to fall back in the servos of Razorclaw and his insurrectionists. But now Terrorcon knew the truth. There was never any communication ban because everyone was dead and the dead couldn't send messages. It was all just a cover-up. The Maximals had killed them all. All but one, at least. How typically Maximal, Terrorcon sneered. They never could see just how dirty their own servos were.

For the next couple of minutes there was nothing but silence as they made their way back to Wasp's hovel. Suddenly Wasp turned and began to make his way back into the jungle. "Where are you going?" Terrorcon demanded, exasperated by his companion's short attention span.

"Wasp want to show Terrorbot something. Cheer Terrorbot up!" The smaller bot called out over his shoulder, not pausing in his trek as Terrorcon struggled to catch up.

Wasp led him to a small open space in the middle of the jungle where the sun was able to peek through the dense canopy and warm his face. There was an upturned container lying on the ground. Wasp pranced happily over to it with a sharp "Here! Look!" commanding Terrorcon to watch as he picked up the container to reveal his prize.

"What happened?" Wasp moaned as he uncovered a brown, wilted looking plant. It might have been a flower once, but now it was nothing more the decaying mulch. Terrorcon sneered at the sight.

"It's dead, you idiot," Terrorcon stated, rolling his optics annoyance. "Did you have that container over it the whole time? Plants are organic. They need sunlight to live. You can just put them in the darkness like that."

"Wasp only wanted to protect flower!" The little flier snapped. Terrorcon could see he was angry at him, angry at himself as well. Wasp sat on the ground and folded his arms, pointedly avoiding Terrorcon's gaze as he stared down at the flower. Great, the flier was sulking. Terrorcon supposed he could shoot him, maybe just graze the arm to get him moving again, but that would probably just drive him into a full-on tantrum. "Look, plants aren't like Cybertronians," Terrorcon explained, hoping he could pull Wasp out of his malaise. "Even when they die they come back to life every spring."

Wasp looked up at him with something like hope. It made his valve feel funny when he looked at that happy face, like he had done something good. Terrorcon shook that thought away. He was being an stupid.

"Really?" Wasp asked brightly. Then he narrowed his optics in suspicion. "How does Terrorbot know so much about organics?"

"We're not all idiots. Now, come on. Let's go."

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Wasp knew he was dreaming. There were colors and sounds and feelings and Wasp didn't know how to process them. This is how the world is supposed to be, his processor said. He saw his sounds and heard his feelings and tasted with his fingers. That was wrong. Here, in this dream, everything was right. Wasp didn't like it. Everything was too sharp, too in focus. It hurt his optics. That was the wrong thing to think. It hurt his processor. His optics had shut down and he was deep in recharge.

Wasp was in a room with dirty walls and strange instruments. There were scanners and funny instruments that frightened Wasp even though he didn't know what they did or who they were meant for. In the middle of the room was a table and sitting at this table was a mech that Wasp knew – he knew – was his progenitor. He looked different. Every time Wasp tried to think of his face all he could hear was ringing bells. But now he could see. The mech was large and broad and mostly white with bits of gray and blue. His mouth was pulled down in a conflicted frown, like he was faced with a problem he didn't know how to handle.

"Do you want to leave?" He asked.

"Please," Wasp begged, without knowing why. "It hurts."

His progenitor looked away. "They'll hunt you down. You're too important to the war effort. You're the first successful…" The mech trailed off and looked back at Wasp. Wasp didn't know what he saw, but it seemed to convince him of something. His progenitor nodded his head. "Okay, we'll leave. We'll escape."

Wasp gasped as he suddenly awoke from recharge. He glanced around his hovel as all the colors of the stone and sky and the sounds of the jungle became mixed up together, making everything right again. Wasp turned over on his side as he slipped back into recharge, already his dream was beginning to fade away.


	6. Chapter 6

Terrorcon laid flat across the ground and slowly took aim with his energy pistol. He could see the infected Predacon shuffling through the valley below. Even as high as he was, Terrorcon could hear the high pitched whine of the mech's internal fans, damaged beyond repair and desperately trying to cool that suffocating heat. Terrorcon shivered as his own internal fans sped up at the mere memory of that fever. The smuggler scowled and squeezed the trigger. A single shot was all that it took. Terrorcon watched as the mech crumpled to the ground. The blast had ripped through his brittle, rusted chassis like a flier through the clouds, destroying the unprotected spark chamber and killing him instantly. "Ha!" Terrorcon gave out a barking laugh and lifted his pistol in triumph. He was a great shot… when his target was slow and he could take the time to aim properly at least. The Predacon stood up and stretched, debating whether or not he should try to venture into one of the cities again. It had been a while since he had seen any sign of the Maximals and that poor mech that he had just put down was the only infected he had come across in a month. Terrorcon wondered if this meant the Maximals had finished cleaning up the mess they had made and had all gone home. He shook his head. Even knowing what he knew it still didn't make any sense. Did the Maximals honestly believe that no one was going to figure it out? They simply couldn't destroy the population of an entire planet and think no one would notice. It was beyond absurd.

Terrorcon stomped back towards Wasp's hovel, scowl firmly in place. He could already feel the euphoria from his kill melt away as that bubbling anger he'd been feeling since learning the truth threatened to rise up and take over. It didn't matter. He'd have plenty of time to cool down before he reached the hovel. Terrorcon took the long way up the mountain, hiking it on foot instead of flying over. Just because he hadn't seen many infected didn't mean he was going to take the chance and draw any that had survived the Maximal holocaust to him with the sound of his jet engines.

Terrorcon came to a sudden stop when he reached the hovel and narrowed his optics at the sight in front of him. Wasp stood there with his servos behind his back, swaying lightly on his pedes, and smirking up at him with an expression that was entirely too innocent. He was trying to be cute, which could only mean he had done something bad. "Wasp has done what Terrorbot said!" The smaller flier proclaimed proudly. Terrorcon searched Wasp's face for some kind of hint of what he was referring to. Terrorcon told him to do many things all the time. 'Shut up,' 'carry this,' 'get out of the way,' 'go throw yourself off a cliff.' Of course, not once had Wasp ever done those things and for the life of him he couldn't figure out why he had bothered to listen to him now. Wasp grinned and stepped away from the entrance to his hovel and threw out his arms like he was presenting Terrorcon with a brand new spaceship. When Terrorcon looked at the hovel he could only groan and slap his servo against his face. Wasp had decorated the rocky outcropping with dozens of picked flowers. "Wasp has given flowers lots and lots of sun. Flowers will live long time now," Wasp insisted. If Terrorcon hadn't been so frustrated with the small flier he might have seen the sly smirk spreading across his face.

Terrorcon threw his servos up in exasperation. "You can't just pick flowers and expect them to live either!" Terrorcon snapped. "They need soil and care! Not be uprooted by some dimwitted Predacon with glitchy programming!"

"Wasp knew it!" Wasp proclaimed, jabbing his finger wildly in Terrorcon's face to emphasize his point. Terrorcon knocked the offending digit away and scowled down at him. Wasp just grinned and placed his servos on his hips. "Terrorbot knows lot about organics," Wasp said in that too innocent voice of his. "Wasp thinks that big, bad smuggler-bot likes pretty, pretty flowers. Does Terrorbot like pretty, pret-AAH!" Wasp squawked as he ducked out of the way of Terrorcon's energy blast. Wasp looked up at the scorch mark high above the cliff and smirked at the other Predacon. "Shot went wide," he said in a sing-song voice.

Terrorcon holstered the pistol and frowned. If he was being perfectly honest he would have admitted that it wasn't his terrible aim that had caused the shot to miss. Even Terrorcon could hit a stationary target that was standing only a few feet from him. But then Terrorcon had never been honest a day in his life. Besides, it didn't really matter anyway. It's not as though a single shot from an energy pistol could seriously harm a healthy bot like Wasp.

"Wasp now has perfect blackmail." The little bot rubbed his servos together and giggled. Terrorcon just rolled his optics.

"And who are you going to tell? We're the only people on this planet!" Wasp stopped laughing at that and gave Terrorcon a confused frown. Terrorcon sighed and rubbed his optics. Wasp was the worst Predacon he had ever met.

The little flier suddenly brightened and pointed accusingly at Terrorcon. "Terrorbot never denied not like flowers. Pretty, pretty- STOP SHOOTING WASP!"

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Terrorcon didn't know what was worse. A city full of rusting shells and wandering infected or one that was completely void of all signs of life. Empty and ghost-like. Soon that pervasive, all-encompassing jungle that the Predacons had long battled, dedicated in their goal of destroying every organic creature within their empire, would rise up and reclaim its lost land. Plants couldn't fight back, and yet the jungle had still won in the end. Terrorcon couldn't help but find that darkly amusing.

"Wasp thinks this is bad idea," Wasp hissed as he followed closely behind.

"The Maximals wiped out most of the infected. There's nothing to worry about. Besides," Terrorcon grumbled. "I figured you'd want to leave Corsicon just as much as I do."

He could see Wasp give a little jump out of the corner of his optic. The small flier whipped his head around and gave Terrorcon an incredulous stare. "Terrorbot will take Wasp to Cybertron?" He asked, his voice tinged with hope.

Terrorcon shrugged, suddenly uncomfortable. "Well, yeah, you did save my life. I figured I could give you a free lift. I'll shove you in a supply closet if you get too annoying, though."

Wasp sniffed delicately at that. "Wasp not annoying. Wasp just operate on different level. Level Awesome."

Terrorcon didn't even bother to dignify that with a reply. He just continued to the shipyards and quickened his pace, forcing the shorter mech to hurry in order to keep up with him. With optics constantly on the lookout for any infected Predacons that had managed to escape the Maximals' clutches, Terrorcon and Wasp slunk through the city.

The shipyards looked as bare and lifeless as the rest of the city. Rows of spaceships were lined up in front of rusted hangars, broken and worthless. They look like they had been cobbled together from leftover Decepticon ships, like some sort of patchwork death machines. Terrorcon cast a critical optic over the ancient spacecrafts. Even though Corsicon was one of the wealthiest planets the Predacons owned, the Battle of Corsicon had lasted months and by the end of the siege the Predacon army must have been pretty desperate to have scraped the bottom of the barrel for these useless heaps of metal.

Terrorcon sighed and began inspecting the first ship he came to. He would just have to make it work. Terrorcon pushed at the door, forcing it to slide open when it became stuck on its track, and slipped inside. The inside of the ship was just as much of a Frankensteinian nightmare as the outside with its mishmash of Predacon, Decepticon, and Maximal parts and held together with little more grease and prayers to Primus. Terrorcon cursed under his breath as he slipped under the console, poking around at the bare wires. It was obvious that the ship had seen action; it may have even been commanded by a smuggler like himself. It had survived whatever battle it had been in, at least long enough to make a proper landing. That didn't mean it would take off, though. Terrorcon doubted it would even break atmosphere before it fell right out of the sky.

Still, Terrorcon had been around ships all his life and if there was any hope of this garbage machine flying again it lay with Terrorcon.

Terrorcon immediately got to work testing the console to see if it had any power left within it. His surroundings melted away as he became absorbed in his work.

"Terrorbot…"

"Shut up, Wasp, I'm trying to do something clever, but that's not going to happen with you yapping- EEP!" Terrorcon gave a high-pitched yelp when he was suddenly pulled out from underneath the console with more force than Wasp was capable of. He found himself staring up into the muzzle of energy canon.

An energy canon that was probably half the size of Terrorcon's whole structure. He gulped at the hard-looking mech wielding the weapon and meekly raised his servos. His progenitor didn't raise a fool, after all. He always told Terrorcon not to bring a pistol to a canon fight. Canons win, servos down, every time.

The mech jerked his head towards Wasp, motioning Terrorcon to stand beside him as he kept his canon steady and trained on the pair. The mech was tall and big with broad shoulders; he towered over the two of them. He could flatten them easily. Of course, Terrorcon consoled himself with the fact that fliers weren't mean to be too large and his structure was perfectly average for someone with his alt mode. The mech raked his red optics over them, assessing them. Terrorcon wondered what the bot could possibly want with them. Maybe he wanted to get off this planet too, or steal their energon perhaps?

Terrorcon scanned the mech in front of him, taking in his perpetual scowl and stiff, professional stance, before his optics fell on his insignia. Maximal.

That was when Terrorcon knew they were going to die.

"Now," the mech drawled out. "You two are going to tell me what in the Pit is going on here. You're not going to run or scream or fight. We are all going to stand here and have a nice, lovely chat or I'll blow your heads off. Understand?"

"Wasp understands!" Wasp nodded his head emphatically, his optics never leaving the canon.

"Good. Where is everyone? Don't lie. I'll know."

Terrorcon shared a worried look with Wasp. Apparently, the bot wasn't with the military or he'd already know. What could they say? Explain to the nice mech with the canon that his fellow Maximals slaughtered an entire planet? He was rather fond of living, thank you very much.

"I'm waiting…" The Maximal tapped a ped against the floor of the ship.

"Wasp don't want to get shot!" Wasp blurted out.

"Then tell me the truth."

"Meanbot won't believe Wasp! Meanbot will shoot Wasp anyway!"

The Maximal gave Wasp a hard stare at that. "I won't shoot unless you give me a reason to. I'm not a monster." The mech spat out the word 'monster' like he had met one before. "I'm an Imperial Peace Marshall from Colony Omicron. I'm looking for a fugitive, only I arrive on this planet and find that there's no one here. Except you two," he amended, tightening his finger on the trigger. "Want to explain why that is?"

Terrorcon smirked at the Maximal. People were always telling him he would never get very far; that he was too stupid, that he never thought anything through. Terrorcon would freely admit that he could probably plan out his schemes a bit better, but he was far from stupid. He knew an opening when he saw it and now was the perfect time to pounce. "Last I heard the Maximals put Corsicon on lockdown. No one was to come in or out without proper authorization. All communication was suspended. If you don't know what's going on, I guess that means you came here without permission," Terrorcon drawled. The Maximal's scowl deepened, but he didn't deny it. "I'm a little curious as to why you think a fugitive would end up here, given the aforementioned security issues. Seems like Corsicon would be too risky a hiding place for someone on the run."

"I don't have to explain myself to you, Pred!" The Maximal snapped. "This planet is now a Maximal colony! There should be a Maximal embassy! You have three nanoclicks to tell me where they are or I'm going to shoot you in the face until I run out of charge!"

Terrorcon could see Wasp edge away from the Maximal out of the corner of his optic, his servo groping around behind him for some kind of weapon. Terrorcon supposed the little flier wasn't a complete idiot after all. The bright red Predacon grinned at the Maximal. "Oh, there was a Maximal embassy, all right," Terrorcon screeched, keeping the Maximal's attention firmly on him. "Who knew unleashing a virus and causing a global pandemic would create such a huge mess? You just miss them. They were here sweeping all the corpses under the proverbial rug."

Terrorcon expected the Maximal to launch into a firm denial, to rant and rage against the Predacon for spreading such malicious lies. The Maximal cop didn't, though. He just looked at Terrorcon with a look of disgust and resignation on his face, like all of this was old news. If this didn't surprise the cop, Terrorcon could only wonder what sort of skeletons the Maximals were hiding in their closets.

"HIIYAA!" Wasp yelled as he bashed the Maximal's head with a metal pipe. With a curse the Maximal whipped around, his canon aiming straight for Wasp's chest. Terrorcon reached for his pistol and drew it, but when he heard the blast – deafening loud as it echoed inside the small ship – Terrorcon knew he had been too late. He shot off two rounds into the mech's back and saw him fall to his knees, alive but too injured to follow him as he ran out, grabbing hold of Wasp and throwing him across his back as he transformed into a jet.

He tried not to think about the large hole in the flier's chest and the burnt wires that stuck out from the gaping wound. He'd seen plenty of injuries like that in the war. It was no big deal. A couple of cycles in a CR tank and they were as good as new. Only Wasp didn't have a CR tank. There was no way that a stasis lock was going to heal this.

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Wasp hated this room with its drab gray color that was right, but still so very, very wrong. The colors didn't sing in this room. They just sat there on the wall doing nothing. They were very lazy colors, if you asked Wasp. They should make some sort of noise, a wonderful cacophony. Gray was not his favorite color. It banged loudly, a staunch rhythm of many pedes up and down the battlefield. Yellow was his favorite. It blared like a horn, toneless and without rhythm or reason. It trumpeted its arrival for the sheer joy of it.

"He really is a remarkable creature." Wasp cocked his head at the sound of a voice and turned around. He could see two mechs staring at him through a window. "I have to admit, I didn't think it was possible," said the black and green mech as he continued to watch Wasp. His companion, the white one with the face like ringing bells, simply nodded his head as the first mech continued. "But his structure is simply incredible… The healing, the anti-viral programs… With structures like these our soldiers will be invincible!"

"It's not perfected yet," the other mech warned. "There are still many things to do."

"Yes, yes," the green mech waved off the other's concern. "I understand all that. Besides, we still have to field test him. The Maximals have landed about a mile from the capital. The battle will be the perfect place to see what this structure is capable of withstanding."

The white-colored Predacon snorted derisively. "He's never learned how to fight and you want to stick him in a battle? I can tell you right now how your tests are going to turn out."

The green mech laughed. "You got me all wrong! I don't want to see how well he fights. I'm going to stick him in front of a Maximal canon and see how long he can survive until his structure finally gives out."

The other bot pulled back in horror at the words.

Wasp woke with a gasp as pain flooded every sensor in his body. "Oooh," Wasp groaned. "Wasp has headache in whole body."

He heard the click of a gun, the sound exploding on his glossa and tasting like smoke and ash. "Yeah, I bet," Terrorcon hissed as he pressed the muzzle against the side of his head. "Considering you should be dead. It's funny how that turns out. You seem to be able to survive anything. Viruses, explosions. So, tell me, what in the Pit are you?"

Wasp just sighed. "Wasp tired of being shot at."


	7. Chapter 7

"How did you cure the virus?" Terrorcon demanded as Wasp shrank back in fear. "How did someone like you figure it out?"

The smaller flier glumly noticed that Terrorcon's servos didn't even shake as he held the pistol against his helm. They were steady and calm and Wasp wildly thought that Terrorcon had done this sort of thing before. "Wasp didn't do anything! Wasp got sick. Wasp was so hot! It melted Wasp's processor. But then Wasp was all better. No, not better, but not sick either."

"You couldn't have just gotten better!" Terrorcon protested. "That's not the way anti-viral software works! If the virus isn't already catalogued in the system then the program won't recognize it as a threat. This is something that every half-wit sparkling knows! Someone has to download the code into the program before the anti-viral will attack it. If it wasn't you who cracked the code then who was it?" Terrorcon growled in frustration as Wasp could only shrug helplessly. "Then what about that super healing?" He demanded. With each new word he spoke Terrorcon's voice became higher and more hysterical. It screeched like grinding metal. Wasp thought he could taste chalk. "For you, a simple stasis lock can heal wounds that are fatal without a CR tank. But you! You can just shrug it off. What are you?" He made it sound like Wasp was some kind of monster.

"Wasp is Predacon!" Wasp snapped back. "Wasp was born on planet and Wasp had a progenitor. Wasp is not a thing!"

"Maybe not," Terrorcon agreed coolly. "But you're not exactly one of us either, are you?"

Wasp shrugged, not saying anything. He didn't have to explain himself to the likes of Terrorcon. Terrorcon holstered his pistol and just stood there and studied Wasp for a long time. Wasp couldn't meet his optics. Every time he did he heard a painful buzzing in his audios. "How were you made?" Terrorcon finally asked. This time it was Wasp who snorted and looked up at the other bot like he was the one who was an idiot.

"Wasp was sparked," the flier drawled. "Don't Terrorbot know how sparklings are made?"

Terrorcon groaned in frustration and it was such a soothing, comforting taste to Wasp. "I meant you body, Wasp, not your spark! How was your structure made?"

"Wasp not sure," he confessed. "But…" Wasp bit his glossa and wondered if he should tell Terrorcon about the dreams. The other flier would probably just call him a cry-sparkling for getting worked up over nightmares, but if Wasp didn't tell Terrorcon then who else was he going to confide in? "Wasp sometimes dreams though and Wasp knows they're memories because everything is the way it looked and smelled and sounded before and it's awful and Wasp hates it. Everything is so right so it's wrong! There's bad sciencebots who hurt Wasp just to see what happens and Wasp's progenitor is there and Wasp's progenitor always looks so sad. Wasp tries to remember progenitor's name but every time Wasp thinks really hard about it all Wasp hears is ringing bells. But Wasp really does try!" Wasp took a big gulping intake as he wound down from his rant. Terrorcon just looked at him with a puzzled frown spread across his handsome face.

"Sciencebots? You were made in a lab?" He asked. "Do you think you could find it again?"

Wasp cowered at the mere thought, but nodded his head anyway. Wasp really didn't want to return but Terrorcon seemed determined and maybe Wasp would be able to find out his progenitor's name.

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Terrorcon shivered as Wasp led him deeper and deeper into the jungle. He flew over the tangled trees and vines, unable to see past the canopy down at the jungle floor he knew lurked somewhere below. He always had a special affinity for plants, despite their organic nature. They should repulse him, like other organic creatures did, but they didn't. Maybe it was because they couldn't talk and Primus knows Terrorcon knew his fair share of bots who could learn to keep their mouths shut. "How do you know you're going the right way?" Terrorcon demanded. "You can't even remember where your own pedes are most days."

"Wasp knows," the smaller bot mumbled quietly. Terrorcon shivered again, unable to repress it. Wasp didn't sound like his friend. "Wasp remember flying far away and everything hurt. This was before Wasp was kept in the dark. Wasp had to be kept hidden or the bad bots would find Wasp."

Terrorcon pulled back, distancing himself from the helicopter in front of him as Wasp's ramblings slowly degenerated into pure nonsense. Terrorcon was beginning to think the virus wasn't the only cause behind Wasp's scrambled processor.

"There it is!"

Terrorcon looked down to see a building overrun with thick green vines. It must have once been painted white, but the true color had long been obscured by dirt and foliage. A large tree had grown straight through the middle, breaking open the high domed ceiling like a soft egg. He doubted that the building had been abandoned for very long, maybe only a few weeks before the fall of Corsicon into Maximal servos, but the jungle… the jungle had already swallowed it whole. Every day the jungle gained new ground, edging closer and closer to the cities. It wouldn't be long before they too looked like this.

They transformed and landed right outside the entrance. Terrorcon was cautious as he followed Wasp inside. If this was a Predacon research facility who knew what sort of security systems this place had. There was the chance that they had been disabled, or had run out of power, but Terrorcon wasn't going to take that chance. He let Wasp lead, figuring if there was some sort of trap it wouldn't really hurt the bot any. He was apparently indestructible, after all.

There was nothing, though. Just long, empty halls and laboratories filled with broken equipment. Terrorcon peeked through one door, ready to move on to the next when he saw it. The walls were covered in bullet holes and energy scorches. Terrorcon knew a firefight when he saw one. "Wasp, over here." Terrorcon stepped inside, taking in the broken one-way mirror on the far side. It looked out into some sort of observatory room. Wasp ran up beside him, took one look at the mirror, and shuddered. "I'm guessing you remember something?" Terrorcon asked. Wasp didn't answer him, though; he just kept up his whispered half-mad litany. Terrorcon was beginning to second guess coming here. If his memories were reducing him to this then maybe it was better that he couldn't remember.

Terrorcon moved away and flicked on the computer console. He began perusing through the files, only half understanding what was being said. A few of the records mentioned a spy within Maximal ranks, someone designated simply as "Delta", who worked for the Center of Research and Development of Cybertron- a Maximal facility and one that required a high-security clearance at that. No Predacon would be able to sneak in there, and yet not only had Delta managed it but the spy had apparently secured top secret information about a Maximal program known as X. The program was created in hopes of being able to artificially reconstruct Starscream's immortal spark. Terrorcon felt his jaw drop as he read how the Maximals experimented on their own prisoners all in a mad attempt to build the perfect soldier. What little information Delta had managed to secure was brief and apparently incomplete, but from what Terrorcon could gleam the Maximals had been unsuccessful. Thank Primus for that, Terrorcon thought. The Maximals already had a virus that could wipe out the entire Predacon race; Terrorcon really didn't want to face down an army of indestructible Maximal soldiers as well.

Even with only a small amount of the Maximal research in their hands, that hadn't stopped the Predacons from conducting their own experiments. Terrorcon read how the Predacon scientists had shifted their focus from creating immortal sparks to indestructible bodies instead. After all, if the body was unkillable then it wouldn't matter how delicate the spark was. Their first successful attempt was… Wasp. Called Protoform Y, in mocking reference to the Maximal's own project. Terrorcon swallowed down the oil that was threatening to rise from his throat. He had his answer. Now it was time to give Wasp's his.

He pulled up Wasp's information and there it was: the name of Wasp's progenitor. "Turncoat," Terrorcon said out loud.

Wasp broke out of his musings. "What?" He asked.

"Your progenitor. That's his name: Turncoat."

Wasp shook his head emphatically. "Terrorbot wrong. Wasp doesn't know progenitor's name, but it isn't that. Name sounds like bells. Turnbot is horrid name. Like scratching."

"It says here that he was pressed into sparking by Razorclaw's government to help restore the population and rebuild the Predacon army. You were taken to a Training House the same day you were sparked. Two months later Turncoat was killed in battle and a week after you were here being turned into some kind of monster."

"Not true!" Wasp insisted. "Wasp's progenitor took Wasp away, made him hide! Stupid computer is lying!"

"The bot you're thinking about was probably just some scientist who felt sorry for you," Terrorcon reasoned as he switched off the console.

"NO!" Wasp screamed, stamping his pedes and shocking Terrorcon's with the sheer force of his voice. "No! No! No! It's wrong! Turncoat is not my progenitor!"

Terrorcon held up his servos in mock surrender. He wasn't sure if he should be amused by Wasp's tantrum or frightened by it. "Fine, whatever. You're right. It's all secret spy stuff. They probably just made it all up."

Wasp folded his arms and glared, but he seemed mollified by Terrorcon's statement. Terrorcon dropped his servos, still darkly amused by Wasp's antics. "Large facility like this," Terrorcon drawled. "Is bound to have a few small ships tucked away for transport. Let's go see if we can find any."

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Terrorcon sucked in a deep intake of pure Cybertron smog. As much as he liked plants, the sick, cloying smell of the jungle made him feel sick; there was nothing like the pure industrial stench of Cybertron. He was home.

He vaguely heard Wasp chattering inanely beside him as he pointed out every. Single. Thing. He. Saw. Terrorcon briefly considered tossing Wasp into the oncoming traffic. It would be the only way to get him to shut up. Terrorcon looked down at the smaller flier as he stared at every new thing with wide open optics. Everything was new and shiny to him; perfect. Terrorcon groaned at the hyper, innocent face and trudged along. He just couldn't bring himself to commit homicide in the face of that, no matter how justified it would be. Besides, Wasp probably wouldn't even be seriously hurt, not with a structure like his.

There was a little voice in the back of Terrorcon's processor whispering to him, telling him how valuable Wasp was, how much money Terrorcon could get if he delivered him to the Tripredacus Council. He'd come to Cybertron thinking that he could restart his smuggling operations, only to find out that Razorclaw's revolt had been put down and that the Gamma Colony, the mad Deceopticon's last outpost, had fallen. Razorclaw and his generals were all dead and the Tripredacus Council had been reinstated by the Maximals as the only legitimate Predacon government. With the rebellion over Terrorcon was facing another job transporting black market goods or, worse yet, going straight. How boring. Also, the pay was slag. But Wasp... Razorclaw had stolen many secret files from the Council when he launched his coup- maybe even Wasp's file. Who knows? Perhaps this "Delta" had been working for the Council when Razorclaw had taken his life's work to create Wasp. It was taking the Council a long time to rebuild what they had lost; all the blackmail, all the research, all their connections within the Maximal government were gone. Not to mention Razorclaw's revolt had cost the Predacons two of their most important energon-producing colonies- Corsicon and Gamma. The Preds were barely scraping by. Yes, he could get a lot of money for Wasp. Anything he asked, the Council would give him.

Or they'd kill him and take Wasp anyway. When making deals with Predacons one had to expect that sort of thing.

Terrorcon looked back down at Wasp. Was it worth the risk? Wasp grinned up at him, humming in near excitement just at the sight of other people. Terrorcon snapped his head back up. No, it wasn't.

Terrorcon stopped and pointed up at a building. "Do you see that?" Terrorcon asked. "That's where you go to find a job. It's the Maximal Licensing Center. That is where Predacons go to obtain a work license needed to work on Cybertron. As damaged as you are you'd probably qualify for one of their social programs, so they'll set up you up with an apartment and get you a nice, simple job like a cleaningbot or something. Good luck." Terrorcon patted him awkwardly on the arm and began to walk off.

"Terrorbot not coming with Wasp?" The flier called out.

Terrorcon sighed and faced him. "Look, you helped me, I helped you. We're even now and I don't particularly want to carry you around like the milestone around my neck. The sort of work that I do isn't exactly legal; you'll just mess it up."

Wasp snorted. "Wasp better smuggler than Terrorbot. Least Wasp can hit target Wasp is aiming for."

Terrorcon scowled darkly. "I'm a decent shot, you mouthy little glitch. You should be thankful that I don't hack you up and sell your parts on the black market. Besides, what help could you possibly give me? You can't fly a ship, you have no idea how to fix an engine, and you're so annoying that I kept you locked in the cargo hold for most of the trip. So, tell me, what can you do other than provide smartaft comments?"

Wasp brushed some invisible dust off his shoulder, looking nonchalant. Terrorcon ground his dentals at the sight. "Wasp can do lots of dangerous things," he pointed out. "Things Terrorbot too scared to do. Not like Wasp stays hurt."

Terrorcon cocked his head at that. The little glitch did have a point.

Fin


End file.
